Pesach Yizkor: Empty Chairs at Empty Tables

(delivered by Rabbi J.B. Sacks on April 30, 2024)

(Singing:)         “There’s a grief that can’t be spoken

There’s a pain goes on and on.

Empty chairs at empty tables

Now my friends are dead and gone”……

 Eight days ago we all sat around our seder tables where we read the haggadah, told the Passover story, drank our fill of wine, and ate our share of matzah. We sat with family and friends and laughed, told stories, sang songs, and ate. Today, on this final day of Passover, we gather here in shul to celebrate the journey that the Israelites made as they crossed the Sea of Reeds.

Yet, at the same time many of us are here today to remember, as the haunting words from Les Miserables says, (again, singing)

There’s a grief that can’t be spoken

There’s a pain goes on and on.

Empty chairs at empty tables

Now my friends are dead and gone.”

We all attended seders, and at many of our seders there were empty chairs and empty tables. Today we remember the chairs and, even more importantly, the people who were sitting there. A chair might be able to be filled, but there are some seats that will never be filled. And so we remember the stories that they loved to share and the memories they left us with.

In Judaism there is an importance given to chairs and what they represent. So today I want to speak about chairs–the chairs we sit in and the chairs we dare not sit in; the chairs of those no longer here with us and the chairs of those yet to be born.

The chair in Judaism is much more than just the physical structure that holds a person off of the floor while they are sitting. Depending on the use of the chair and who has sat in it there is a tremendous level of holiness that can be attached to the chair.

Shortly before Rosh Hashanah in 1808, one of Rebbe Nachman’s followers, the shochet (ritual slaughterer) of Teplik, brought the Rebbe an exquisitely handcrafted chair. The Rebbe asked the shochet how long it had taken him to make the chair, and he replied that he had worked an hour a day for the previous six months. The Rebbe said, “Then for half a year, you spent an hour each day thinking of me.”

During the Cossack raids against the Jews in the Ukraine in the early 1920s, the chair was dismantled and cut into small pieces by Reb Tzvi Aryeh Lippel. He carried it from Tcherin to Kremenchug, some twenty miles distant, running nearly the entire time. The chair was deposited with the Rosenfeld family.

In 1936 Reb Moshe Ber Rosenfeld brought the chair to Jerusalem. In 1959 it was restored by craftsmen from the Israel Museum. In 1984 the chair was again refinished, by Katriel’s of Jerusalem, and placed on display in the Breslov synagogue in the Meah Shearim neighborhood of Jerusalem, where it can be seen today.

Many of us may have grown up in a home where no one would dare sit in our father’s chair. not because he was worried that we would stain it or change the shape of the cushion, but simply because it was a sign of our respect. Interestingly this is something that the Talmud presents to us.^[1] In it, the rabbis ask: What is “fear,” and what is “honor”?

• “Fear” means that the son is not to stand in his father’s place, nor to sit in his place; not to contradict him, nor to tip the scales against him.
• “Honor” means that the son must supply his father with food and drink, provide him with clothes and footwear, and assist his coming in or going out of the house.

At a point in the Passover Seder we go to the door and open it for Elijah. We have a cup of wine waiting for him so that he should be able to participate in our seder. But, why don’t we have a chair?

Well, while we don’t have a chair for Elijah at the Passover Seder, there is a time when we do set aside a chair for him. At every Brit Milah we set a special chair for Elijah, and just before the circumcision the baby is placed momentarily on that chair. As our tradition teaches Elijah is there at every circumcision to protect the child as he is brought into the covenant.

Now, you would think that no one would dare sit in Elijah’s chair, yet, it is said that if a woman has been having difficulty getting pregnant, she should sit in Elijah’s Chair for a moment. While this sounds like a bunch of poppycock, if you talk to a “Moyl” they will tell you that it has worked more times than you would ever believe possible.

Yet chairs are also there to hold us in our moments of sadness as we mourn those who have passed on. The traditional chairs that you will see in a shiva home are low to the floor, they hold us in our moments of despair, sadness, and grief. By sitting in those chairs we signal to our community our state of existence at that moment. The Shiva chair is one that holds us just off the floor as we feel the pain of our loss and the rip in our souls.

Chairs are important as they hold us and those we love as we tell our stories, enjoy our meals, and pass traditions on from one generation to another. Yet it is the people in the chairs that give the chairs their importance and meaning. Today, as many of us come to remember those who filled those chairs, we cannot help but feel what is expressed as the song from Les Miz continues,

(singing)          “Oh my friends, my friends, forgive me,

that I live and you are gone. ….”

Today on the last day of Passover as we gather here to recite Yizkor and remember those who have passed on to the next world we have the opportunity to remember:

• Who was sitting in the chairs of seders gone by?
• Who was sitting around your Thanksgiving table cracking jokes or carving the turkey?
• Who was negotiating for the Afikoman at your childhood seder?
• Who was standing over the BBQ at the family reunion?
• Who was never actually in a chair but nevertheless had an important seat at the table because they were making sure that every plate and bowl was never empty?

All of the people that we have come to remember had lives that encompassed much more than chairs they occupied. As I look around the room here at this Yizkor moment, I can’t help but see empty chairs once filled by beloved, fellow CAH members.

• Jerry and Myrna
• Stella and Bob
• Irv and Ann
• Milt
• Jack and Ann
• Arnie
• Betty
• Amnon
• Roz
• Norma
• Judye

(singing)                      There’s a grief that can’t be spoken,

There’s a pain goes on and on,

Empty chairs here in our shul,

now that family and friends are gone.

• Here they talked about survival.
• Here they sang praising G-d’s Name.
• Here they helped us during sad occasions.
• Here they shared their joyful life moments.
• Here we argued and learned Torah together.
• Here we celebrated holy days,
• Here we fasted and broke the fast together,
• Here we came together to honor Shabbat and tradition.
• Here we enjoyed each other’s company.

Now that they’re gone nothing will ever be the same. But the chairs we remember today point the way to the lessons they left us–lessons of love and honor, of resilience, of the importance of showing up, of community, lessons about G!d and tradition, about moral values and ethical sensitivities, lessons about family–the nuclear family and the gantza mishpocho, the larger fabric that always encompassed our spiritual family.

We take a moment to reflect on one chair, one person, and the lessons given. […Is the person in the chair?…What would you say to them?…What are they saying to do you?] Take a few moments to be in this moment. Return to the room when you are ready.

May we continue to remember the chairs of our lives, the people who inhabited them, and how grateful we are that they loomed so large for us, giving us love, life lessons, and gifts of resilience and hope. Amen.

^[1] BT Kiddushin 31b.